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Yesterday, President of Engage Cuba, James Williams praised U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) Secretary designate Sonny Perdue for publicly supporting expanded trade with Cuba in his hearing before the Senate Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry Committee about his nomination to be agriculture secretary.

“USDA Secretary designate Sonny Perdue is an exceptionally qualified nominee to lead the USDA. Mr. Perdue has long been an advocate of expanding trade with Cuba’s $2 billion agricultural import market,” said President of Engage Cuba, James Williams. “We’re very optimistic that Mr. Perdue will be confirmed by the Senate and will continue to support American agribusiness by advancing efforts to lift the U.S. embargo on Cuba.”
In an exchange with committee member Senator John Boozman from Arkansas, Mr. Perdue said, “with respect to Cuba, for those of you on the Gulf Coast and those along the East Coast as well as those who have been mentioned by your colleagues in the upper midwest, I think we would love have Cuba as a customer in many things. I led an ag delegation from Georgia to Cuba as Governor in 2010 and I found then as much of the problem there regarding the demand was the ability to pay and the ability to finance there as much anything.”

As Mr. Perdue notes, American producers are able to sell their products to Cuba. However, they are unable to offer private financing for the sale of agricultural commodities to Cuba. As a result, American farmers have consistently lost market share in Cuba’s market every year since 2009. While this restriction is codified in law and would require an act of Congress, Mr. Perdue went on to announce his support for legislative efforts to remove these financing restrictions.

“So I think we have the product they need and they would like the product. The real issue I heard regarding Cuba was the financing part and certainly that would come probably under another area, not the USDA, but I would support their efforts if we could get private financing,” Mr. Perdue added. A full transcript is available here.